Dare to read
by Chloe Watton
Summary: The Divergent characters are forced to read the 'Divergent Trilogy' to gain their freedom. What can someone who knows the future do to correct it?
1. Prologue

**A/N: Soo, I know that this storyline is WAY too common, but I wanted to share my interpretation :) This is the prologue, so the other chapters will be longer.**

 **TRIS' POV**

"LET ME OUT!" Eric roars, his fists pounding noisily against the metal door. His hair is still ruffled from sleep and his cheeks are flushed a dark crimson.

"Eric, stop!" Max growls, "you're giving me a headache."

Eric whirls around, fists clenched. "Oh, I'm so terribly sorry," he says, putting on a look of mock innocence. He smiles forcefully at Max, the holes that his piercings occupy stretching impossibly wider.

"Don't push me, Eric," Max warns, his voice dangerously quiet. "Just let it go, alright? We've been here for hours."

Eric's eyes widen in disbelief. He runs a shaky hand through his greasy hair, tucking a stray lock behind his ear. "DAUNTLESS. DON'T. GIVE. UP!" he hollers, emphasising each word with yet another strike to the metal door.

"Dude, chill," Uriah whines, "you're acting like a teenage girl!"

Eric's jaw hardens and his cheeks flush quickly – as if he'd been struck from an unexpected direction. "You'd better shut your mouth before I—"

Max clears his throat. "You'll do nothing of the sort." He gives Eric a pointed look. "What did that letter say, again?"

A kaleidoscope of expressions pass over Eric's face, too quickly for Max to catch them all. But he did see disbelief, bitterness, exasperation and more disbelief. Eric tosses him the crumpled envelope from the inside pocket of his jacket and drops down into the seat beside him. "Take a look for yourself."

Max clears his throat and starts to read aloud.

 _To whom it may concern,_

 _You have all been relocated from Dauntless. You will stay here until you complete the tasks requested of you. In the training room, located on the ground floor, you will find a package containing three books. You are required to read these books before you are permitted to leave the premises as they contain vital information that may come of some use to you in the future._

 _There is no way to escape, and any attempt to do so will result in wasted efforts._

 _Eric, Max, Tris, Al, Caleb, Four, Uriah, Christina, Will, Peter, Marlene, Lynn, Zeke and Shauna._

 _Be brave."_

Christina snorts. "So what, we're stuck in this house until we read three books?"

I nod. "That seems to be the case." I pause thoughtfully. "But why are we here? We only arrived in Dauntless yesterday."

Four shakes his head. "If the initiates have been brought here, it must mean that they are more involved in this than we first thought."

Max nods. "Uriah, go and get the books from the training room and bring them back here as quickly as possible."

Uriah frowns. "Why do I have to go? Can't you make Eric do it instead?"

Max raises an eyebrow at Uriah. "Just do as I am asking, Uriah. Besides, I'm sure there will be some cake in the kitchen…"

Uriah scurries from the room, not waiting for Max to finish his sentence. The word 'cake' was enough of a persuasion for him go.

Christina chuckles softly. "I swear that boy is always thinking about food."

Zeke puts his head in his hands. "You have no idea…"


	2. Chapter 1

**TRIS' POV**

 **30 minutes later…**

Eric paces from one side of the room to the next, his hands balled tightly into fists at his sides. Max puts his head in his hands and breathes deeply through his nose.

"Do you have to do that?" he asks, his eyebrows drawing together in confusion. Eric stiffens.

"Uriah has been gone for HALF AN HOUR!" Eric roars, his voice growing louder as his temper flares. "I swear to god if he –"

Zeke runs a hand through his hair. "Really, Eric? You'll do what? He's just a kid, cut him some slack."

"Just shut it, both of you," Four hisses through clenched teeth, "before I lose my patience."

Eric snorts. "Yeah? What are _you_ going to do about it, _Four?"_

I frown, trying to push the fog from my mind. Eric quirks an eyebrow at Four, a smirk tugging at the corner of his mouth. My frown deepens. Eric knows something that the rest of us don't.

The sound of footsteps and heavy breathing pulls me from my daze. I look up to see Uriah leaning against the door frame, a large box tucked firmly under his arm.

"It's about time!" Eric snaps. "What took you so long?"

Uriah's smile widens. "This place is HUGE!" he exclaims. "I got lost."

Eric's eyes narrow in suspicion. "Why is the box open?"

Uriah smiles sheepishly. "Well, I, um…" he clears his throat. "My curiosity got the better of me."

Zeke frowns. "What's in there?"

Uriah shrugs. "Three books, just as the letter said."

Max clears his throat. "We are trapped here until we read those books. The quicker we start, the sooner we can leave, so everybody sit down and shut the hell up!"

Uriah hands Max the box and takes a seat beside me. Eric purses his lips, but perches on the edge of a footstool, prepared to make a quick exit if trouble presents itself.

Max sighs. "Thank you."

He retrieves the first book from the box and his eyes widen involuntarily.

Four frowns. "What is it?"

Max shakes his head. "If this is what I think it is, then these books are more important than they appear."

Peter snorts. "Yeah right. Let's just get this over with."

Max nods. "Who wants to read first?"

"Me, me, me!"

Uriah snatches the book from Max's outstretched hand and drops back down beside me. He clears his throat.

 **CHAPTER ONE**

"Aren't you going to read the blurb?" Will asks, his eyebrows drawing together in puzzlement.

Uriah shakes his head. "I'm sure all will be revealed soon enough. We wouldn't want to spoil it, would we?" He wiggles his eyebrows playfully.

Will sighs. "Fine, I see your point."

 **There is one mirror in my house. It is behind a sliding panel in the hallway upstairs. Our faction allows me to stand in front of it on the second day of every third month, the day my mother cuts my hair.**

I shudder internally. The book is written from the perspective of an Abnegation.

"Great," Peter grumbles, "a Stiff."

Christina nudges me sharply in the ribs. "The Abnegation only get to look in the mirror ONCE every THREE MONTHS?" she hisses. "That's insane!"

Zeke chuckles. "You should know how boring the Abnegation are."

I force myself to smile, trying to shake off Zeke's words. I'm not Abnegation anymore. I'm Dauntless.

 **I sit on the stool and my mother stands behind me with the scissors, trimming. The strands fall on the floor in a dull, blond ring.**

I try to neutralise my expression, hiding any traces of the shock pulsing through my veins. I've always been a good liar.

 **When she finishes, she pulls my hair away from my face and twists it into a knot. I note how calm she looks and how focused she is. She is well-practised in the art of losing herself. I can't say the same of myself.**

 **I sneak a look at my reflection when she isn't paying attention – not for the sake of vanity, but out of curiosity.**

Will frowns. "I've never heard of a curious Abnegation."

Caleb shrugs. "Not everyone is born where they belong."

 **A lot can happen to a person's appearance in three months. In my reflection, I see a narrow face, wide, round eyes, and a long, thin nose – I still look like a little girl, though sometime in the last few months I turned sixteen. The other factions celebrate birthdays, but we don't. It would be self-indulgent.**

My eyes widen in shock. The book is from the perspective of an Abnegation, yet there are many Dauntless trapped here to read the books. That must mean that the Abnegation chose to transfer to Dauntless.

The knot in my stomach tightens. What if the book is from my perspective?

"WHAT!" Uriah cries, "the Abnegation don't celebrate birthdays? That's insane!"

Marlene giggles. "You're just upset about not having cake."

Uriah shrugs. "I do like cake, especially the Dauntless kind."

 **There," she says when she pins the knot in place. Her eyes catch mine in the mirror. It is too late to look away, but instead pf scolding me, she smiles at our reflection. I frown a little. Why doesn't she reprimand me for staring at myself?**

Christina shakes her head. "That's stupid."

I frown. "What is?"

"The Abnegation only get to look in the mirror once every three months, yet they get scolded for looking at their reflection the one time that they're actually permitted to?"

I shrug. "That's just the way it is."

 **So today is the day," she says. "Yes, I reply."**

 **Are you nervous?"**

 **I stare into my own eyes for a moment. Today is the day of the aptitude test that will show me which of the five factions I belong in. And tomorrow, at the Choosing Ceremony, I will decide on a faction; I will decide the rest of my life; I will decide to stay with my family or abandon them.**

"Who knew that an Abnegation could be so dramatic," Eric coughs, "She's definitely going to transfer."

Shauna frowns. "I agree."

 **No," I say. "The tests don't have to change our choices."**

My blood runs cold. I remember having this exact conversation with my mother.

 **Right." She smiles. "Let's go eat breakfast."**

 **Thank you. For cutting my hair."**

 **She kisses my cheek and slides the panel over the mirror. I think my mother could be beautiful, in a different world. Her body is thin beneath the gray robe. She has high cheekbones and long eyelashes, and when she lets her hair down at night, it hangs in waves over her shoulders. But she must hide that beauty in Abnegation.**

"Why do the Abnegation insist on living such simplistic lifestyles?" Lynn asks.

"The Abnegation are forced to reject a life of vanity and self-indulgence, therefore protecting themselves from greed and envy, which are considered forms of selfishness," Four says, his voice rough.

Lynn nods. "But why do they wear grey clothing?"

"They wear grey to be less noticeable as they prefer simplistic functionality over frivolous style."

Uriah raises an eyebrow at Four. "Dude, how do you know so much about Abnegation?"

Four shrugs.

 **We walk together to the kitchen. On these mornings when my brother makes breakfast, and my father's hand skims my hair as he reads the newspaper, and my mother hums as she clears the table – it is on these mornings that I feel the guiltiest for wanting to leave them.**

"She shouldn't feel guilty for wanting to leave," Shauna says, "she should choose to be where she feels she belongs."

Max shakes his head. "It's different in Abnegation, Shauna. The Abnegation are the most loyal to their faction, and it's seen as an act of betrayal if they leave." Max meets Four's gaze. "Remember Marcus Eaton's kid?"

I nod. "Yes," I say, "The rumours instigated by the Erudite only made things worse. Marcus was devastated."

Four purses his lips, but otherwise remains silent.

"Page break," Uriah says, "Shall I continue?"

Max nods. "Let's just get this over with."

 **The bus stinks of exhaust. Every time it hits a patch of uneven pavement, it jostles me from side to side, even though I'm gripping the seat to keep myself still. My older brother, Caleb, stands in the aisle, holding a railing above his head to keep himself steady.**

"Woah," Christina gasps, "this book is about you, isn't it Tris?"

I nod.

Will frowns. "Did you know?"

I shrug. "Not really, I had a suspicion, but I didn't know for certain."

Uriah's eyes widen, and he points at me accusingly. "You're _his_ sister?" he asks incredulously. "You're related to a _nose_? That's practically an insult."

My lips part in surprise. "A what?"

Uriah smirks. "A nose. It's Dauntless slang for Erudite."

"Oh."

 **We don't look alike.**

Uriah rolls his eyes. "Really? I never noticed."

 **He has my father's dark hair and hooked nose and my mother's green eyes and dimpled cheeks. When he was younger, that collection of features looked strange, but now it suits him. If he wasn't Abnegation, I'm sure the girls at school would stare at him.**

Caleb wrinkles his nose in disgust.

 **He also inherited my mother's talent for selflessness. He gave his seat to a surely Candor man on the bus without a second thought.**

I shake my head. "You always made it look so easy."

Caleb sighs. "It wasn't hard, Beatrice."

Eric raises an eyebrow. " _Beatrice?"_ he shakes his head. "It doesn't suit you."

 **The Candor man wears a black suit with a white tie – Candor standard uniform. Their faction values honesty and sees the truth as black and white, so that's what they wear.**

"Why do the Dauntless only wear black?" Christina asks. "At least in Candor everything wasn't so dull."

Max shrugs. "Dauntless wear black because it's their designated colour. There's no real reasoning behind it."

 **The gaps between the buildings narrow and the roads are smoother as we near the heart of the city. The building that was once called the Sears Tower – we call it the Hub – emerges from the fog, a black pillar in the skyline. The bus passes under the elevated tracks. I have never been on a train, though they never stop running and there are tracks everywhere. Only the Dauntless rise them.**

Uriah stops reading, a smirk playing on his lips. "That's because the Dauntless know how to live."

Al snorts. "The Dauntless are crazed lunatics."

Zeke puts a hand on his chest. "Ouch. I'm hurt."

Shauna giggles.

 **Five years ago, volunteer construction workers from Abnegation repaved some of the roads. They started in the middle of the city and worked their way outward until they ran out of materials. The roads where I live are still cracked and patchy, and it's not safe to drive on them. We don't have a car anyway.**

"Let me guess," Christina says, "the Abnegation don't have cars because it's considered 'self-indulgent'?"

I nod. "Some people with government jobs had a car, but most people didn't. Luxury items are forbidden."

Christina rolls her eyes. "How did you survive there for sixteen years?"

I shrug. "It wasn't all bad. Sometimes the simplicity was comforting."

 **Caleb's expression is placid as the bus sways and jolts on the road. The gray robe falls from his arm as he clutches a pole for balance. I can tell by the constant shift of his eyes that he is watching the people around us – striving to see only them and to forget himself. Candor values honesty, but our faction, Abnegation, values selflessness.**

I sigh. "Earlier, I had thought this to be his efforts at forgetting himself, but now I know that it was only observation, an Erudite quality."

Caleb shrugs. "I never truly belonged there, and neither did you. It's not a crime to leave."

I run a hand through my tangled hair. "Children from Abnegation are supposed to be loyal, Caleb. We were selfish for leaving them."

 **The bus stops in front of the school and I get up, scooting past the Candor man. I grab Caleb's arm as I stumble over the man's shoes. My slacks are too long, and I've never been that graceful.**

"You're still more graceful than me, Tris," Lynn says, laughing. "That's got to count for something, right?"

I smile. "Right."

A frown creases Christina's forehead. "See, that's another reason why Abnegation clothes are ridiculous. How can they be selfless if they're constantly tripping over their slacks?"

Will puts his head in his hands. "Can you please stop going on about the clothes?"

Christina narrows her eyes. "I'll stop going on about the clothes when they decide to do something about it."

 **The Upper Levels building is the oldest of the three schools in the city: Lower Levels, Mid-Levels, and Upper Levels. Like all the other buildings around it, it is made of glass and steel. In front of it is a large metal sculpture that the Dauntless climb after school, daring each other to go higher and higher. Last year I watched one of them fall and break her leg. I was the one who ran to get the nurse.**

"That was you?" Lynn asks.

I nod. "Yes."

Lynn gives me a small smile. "Thanks Tris."

 **Aptitude tests today," I say. Caleb is not quite a year older than I am, so we are in the same year at school.**

 **He nods as we pass through the front doors. My muscles tighten the second we walk in. The atmosphere feels hungry, like every sixteen-year-old is trying to devour as much as he can get of this last day. It is likely that we will not walk these halls again after the Choosing Ceremony – once we choose, our new factions will be responsible for finishing our education.**

 **Our classes are cut in half today, so we will attend half of them before the aptitude tests, which take place after lunch. My heart rate is already elevated.**

Uriah chuckles softly. "A bit nervous, Tris?"

I can feel the heat creeping up my neck. "I didn't know what was going to happen."

Max smirks. "It's okay to admit weakness, you know."

I nod.

 **You aren't at all worried about what they'll tell you?" I ask Caleb.**

 **We pause at the split in the hallway where he will go one way, toward Advanced Math, and I will go the other, toward Faction History.**

 **He raises an eyebrow at me. "Are you?"**

 **I could tell him I've been worried for weeks about what the aptitude test will tell me – Abnegation, Candor, Erudite, Amity, or Dauntless?**

 **Instead I smile and say, "Not really."**

 **He smiles back. "Well… have a good day."**

"Could you be anymore fake?" Zeke asks, an eyebrow raised in suspicion.

I smile sheepishly. If I knew that Caleb was going to transfer to Erudite, would things have been different between us?

 **I walk toward Faction History, chewing on my lower lip. He never answered my question.**

 **The hallways are cramped, though the light coming through the windows creates the illusion of space; they are one of the only places where the factions mix, at our age. Today the crowd has a new kind of energy, a last day mania.**

 **A girl with long curly hair shouts "Hey!" next to my ear, waving at a distant friend. A jacket sleeve smacks me on the cheek. Then an Erudite boy in a blue sweater shoves me. I lose my balance and fall hard on the ground.**

"The Erudite are jerks," Uriah mumbles under his breath.

Caleb glares at him. "The Dauntless are imbecilic fools"

Uriah's eyes narrow. "The Erudite are stuck-up idiots!"

"Yeah? Well the Dauntless are –"

"Shut up, both of you!" Will snaps. "You both have your own opinions, but you don't have to be so open about it."

Max nods. "Thank you, Will."

 **Out of my way, Stiff," he snaps, and continues down the hallway.**

"See what I mean?" Uriah says, pointing at Caleb. "They think they're so much better than every –"

"Uriah…" Max warns, his voice hard.

Uriah puts his hands up in surrender. "Okay, okay."

 **My cheeks warm. I get up and dust myself off. A few people stopped when I fell, but none of them offered to help me. Their eyes follow me to the edge of the hallway. This sort of thing has been happening to others in my faction for months now – the Erudite have been releasing antagonistic reports about Abnegation, and it has begun to affect the way we relate at school.**

"Uriah's right," Zeke says, a smirk tugging at the corner of his mouth. "The Erudite are jerks. They'll do anything to make them feel better about themselves."

Uriah's smirk widens to a grin. "See, he gets it."

 **The gray clothes, the plain hairstyle, and the unassuming demeanor of my faction are supposed to make it easier for me to forget myself, and easier for everyone else to forget me too. But now they make me a target.**

 **I pause by a window in the E Wing and wait for the Dauntless to arrive. I do this every morning. At exactly 7:25, the Dauntless prove their bravery by jumping from a moving train.**

"See," Caleb says, "imbecilic fools!"

Zeke glares at Caleb. "Stay out of this, _nose."_

Peter scoffs. "So you _are_ a stalker," he mumbles, "I should've guessed."

 **My father calls the Dauntless "hellions." They are pierced, tattooed, and black-clothed.**

Marlene smirks. "But that's what makes us cool!"

 **Their primary purpose is to guard the fence that surrounds our city. From what, I don't know.**

"I wonder what's out there," Al wonders aloud.

Christina and Will nod in agreement.

Eric shrugs. "Nothing. It's all waste land that didn't recover from the war."

 **They should perplex me. I should wonder what courage – which is the virtue they value most – has to do with a metal ring through your nostril. Instead my eyes cling to them wherever they go.**

"You truly are a Dauntless at heart, Tris," Shauna says, smiling.

"Or a Dauntless-wannabe that will never survive initiation," Peter says slyly.

 **The train whistle blares, the sound resonating in my chest. The light fixed to the front of the train clicks on and off as the train hurtles past the school, squealing on iron rails. And as the last few cars pass, a mass exodus of young men and woman in dark clothing hurl themselves from the moving cars, some dropping and rolling, others stumbling a few steps before regaining their balance. One of the boys wraps his arms around a girl's shoulders, laughing.**

 **Watching them is a foolish practice. I turn away from the window and press through the crowd to the Faction History classroom.**

"That's the end of chapter one," Uriah says, balancing the book on his knee.

"Finally," Eric whines, cracking his knuckles individually, "that was pointless."

Zeke nods. "I agree. The only thing we learnt was that the Erudite are total id – "

"You'd better not finish that sentence, Zeke," Max barks. Zeke presses his lips together.

"So," Uriah says, "who wants to read next?"

 **A/N: So, what did you think? I'm sorry it took me so long to update, but I'm really working on making my chapters longer.**

 **Reviews are greatly appreciated :)**


	3. Chapter 2

Zeke snatches the book from Uriah's outstretched hands, a smirk tugging at the corner of his mouth. "I don't know how you got an aptitude for Dauntless, little brother. Your reflexes are slower than Shauna's!

Shauna swats at his arm, her hand balling into a fist mid-air, but Zeke leans back, dodging the punch with ease. He points a finger at her to justify his point. "See what I mean?"

Eric rolls his eyes, his brow puckered slightly as his eyebrows draw together. "Can we just hurry up and read these stupid books? I don't know about you, but I actually have a life to get back to."

Uriah snorts. "Yeah, like what? Scaring children?"

Eric glares at him, but otherwise stays silent. After getting an encouraging nod from Max, Zeke starts reading.

 **The tests begin after lunch. We sit at the long tables in the cafeteria, and the test administrators call ten names at a time, one for each testing room. I sit next to Caleb and across from our neighbour Susan.**

 **Susan's father travels throughout the city for his job, so he has a car and drives her to and from school every day. He offered to drive us too, but as Caleb says, we prefer to leave later and would not want to inconvenience him.**

 **Of course not.**

Christina looks at me incredulously. "I never thought _you_ knew how to be sarcastic, Tris."

I smile sheepishly. "There are a lot of things you don't know about me."

 **The test administrators are mostly Abnegation volunteers, although there is an Erudite in one of the testing rooms and a Dauntless in another to test those of us from Abnegation, because the rules state that we can't be tested by someone from our own faction. The rules also say that we can't prepare for the test in any way, so I don't know what to expect.**

Zeke pauses, his brow puckered, lips parted. I can almost hear the wheels turning in his brain.

"Why can't someone from your own faction administrate your aptitude test?" he asks, a frown replacing his usual trademark smirk. He looks at each of us in turn, waiting for an answer that nobody knows the answer to.

Max clears his throat. "It's just the rules, Zeke. Let it go."

 **My gaze drifts from Susan to the Dauntless tables across the room.**

Uriah prods me sharply in the ribs with his index finger. "Wow Tris, stalker much?"

The blood rushes to my cheeks, and I find myself tugging my jacket tighter around my shoulders subconsciously.

 **They are laughing and shouting and playing cards. At another set of tables, the Erudite chatter over books and newspapers, in constant pursuit of knowledge. A group of Amity girls in yellow and red sit in a circle on the cafeteria floor, playing some king of hand-slapping game involving a rhyming song. Every few minutes I hear a chorus of laughter from them as someone is eliminated and has to sit in the centre of the circle. At the table next to them, Candor boys make wide gestures with their hands. They appear to be arguing about something, but it must not be serious, because some of them are still smiling.**

"Yeah right," Christina snorts, throwing an icy glare in Peter's direction. "People were smiling because that idiot wouldn't shut up about his dad's new car."

Peter's cheeks flush a deep crimson. "You're only jealous that _my_ dad could afford a car."

Christina's hands clench into fists at her sides, and I can feel that there is a storm rising. Neither of them will back down without a fight.

"Yeah? I've heard there are benefits to sucking up to Jeanine Matthews, aren't there Peter?"

"SHUT UP, BOTH OF YOU!" Max roars, pushing back from his seat so fast that it almost topples over. "We will never finish these books if you two can't learn to keep your mouth shut."

 **At the Abnegation table, we sit quietly and wait. Faction customs dictate even idle behaviour and supersede individual preference. I doubt all the Erudite want to study all the time, or that every Candor enjoys a lively debate, but they can't defy the norms of their faction any more than I can.**

"That's true," Will says thoughtfully. "One person cannot defy the normality of their faction without drawing too much attention to themselves. So essentially, you are forced to support customs that you do not necessarily believe in until you turn sixteen."

I nod in agreement. I was manipulated into thinking that I belonged in Abnegation because it was unheard of to think differently.

 **Caleb's name is called in the next group. He moves confidently toward the exit. I don't need to wish him luck or assure him that he shouldn't be nervous. He knows where he belongs, and as far as I know, he always has. My earliest memory of him is from when we were four years old. He scolded me for not giving my jump rope to a little girl on the playground who didn't have anything to play with. He doesn't lecture me often anymore, but I have his look of disapproval memorized.**

"I still can't believe that you transferred," I whisper. The image of my father, disappointment evidently shown on his face, is brought to the front of my mind. Momentary guilt courses through me until I can convince myself that I am not to blame.

"I think that I've always known – deep down – that I didn't truly belong in Abnegation," I continue, my gaze meeting his for a brief second before I look away, "but you? You fooled us all."

Caleb takes a deep breath. His eyes are down cast and his hands are clasped together in his lap. I notice that his fingers fumble together clumsily as he struggles to find an answer.

 **I have tried to explain to him that my instincts are not the same as his – it didn't even enter my mind to give my seat to the Candor man on the bus – but he doesn't understand. "Just do what you're supposed to," he always says. It is that easy for him. It should be that easy for me.**

But it isn't, and it never was.

* * *

 **A/N: Okay, I know this is a little shorter than usual, but I haven't updated in so long, so I wanted to get a chapter out asap.**

 **All of my stories will be continued!**

 **Reviews are greatly appreciated :)**


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